


complicated

by decidingdolan



Series: grey (if only) [2]
Category: The Amazing Spider-Man (Movies - Webb)
Genre: Angst, Drabble, F/M, Memories, Musing, Regret, Second Person, recollections
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-08
Updated: 2014-06-08
Packaged: 2018-02-03 21:36:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 713
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1757611
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/decidingdolan/pseuds/decidingdolan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A question. Red Tape. Lined yellow note. Gwen's kiss. Peter Parker takes down a photo, and glances back.</p>
            </blockquote>





	complicated

Sometimes you glance back at specific moments in time and think, _this wasn't how I planned it. This wasn't how I wanted it to go. This wasn't what was supposed to happen. This wasn't. This_ wasn't.

And you marvel, you gawk, you stop and you pause. You're still there when it's turned into a past, when it's become an actual event that happened. That happened. Past. Tense. Turned into history. Yours.

And you're still there. You're still there because you don't believe. Because you wanted to stand at the crossroads. Because it's happened. It's happened and you'd rather it didn't. Because it's happened and time has gone and returned and stayed and you're forced to a different point on the timeline.

An alternate timeline, possibly, in your mind.

If only, if only. The words keep echoing, ringing, reverberating like they are locked in a cell inside your head.

If only, if only. They're saying, screaming, struggling.

If only, if only, they're asking you to let them go.

But you can't. You don't. And you wouldn't.

You asked a question. It's happened. You know the answer. You knew the answer.

You didn't want to.

You didn't want to.

Inevitable has become your least favorite word.

_Do I have to lose you too????_

You asked, four question marks punctuating your scrawly writing on a lined, yellow piece of torn notebook paper, pasted atop the picture of you and her with glaring red tape.

That day.

Of course you remembered.

Grey turtleneck. Rose colored lips. Straw blonde hair wrapped in a pony tail. Her favorite skirt.

Tumbling onto the bed. Her hands around your neck.

Your hand holding up the phone, checking a message or something - you don't remember. Her perfume, the one from Paris (lavender. Was that it?) mingling with the familiar sense of your room.

Wait, she said suddenly, her palm on top of yours. Warm. Pastel painted nails.

Let's take a picture.

Sure, you answered, sure. Tapped on the screen.

She kissed you before you knew. Peck on the cheek, and you squeezed an eye shut.

Pressed the shutter.

You're staring at a grave. A name carved on solid stone. A body buried underground. A space made personal amidst the rest.

You read her name.

The question's answered. The reply was yours. Had always been.

You didn't want it to.

You didn't want it to.

You wanted London. You wanted swinging through those historic buildings. The British Museum. Making those Beatles jokes. You wanted the Thames. The Tower Bridge. The rainy days. Pitter patter. Whatever, whatever, Eliza.

You'd never been.

The country was only an idea. Union Jack flag. Accents.

And Oxford.

She'd gotten it, your girl. She did. Even if it's between her and some Albert Einstein incarnation, she'd gotten it, you had full, ridiculous amount of confidence in her, your girl, she'd have gotten it.

She'd have gotten it, and she'd have gone away.

You'd have gone away, with her.

Lived a life on that alternate timeline, not the one that's skewed over. Not a point from where you're hesitant to take another step.

You moped. You sulked. You disappeared for days, because you couldn't...just _be_.

The streets and the avenues. That's where she was. Existed. Corners and blocks and delis and ice cream parlors. Korean places and Chinese takeouts and falafels to go.

Sunshine and gloomy clouds and red, ruined skies. Flickering stars and a waning moon.

Darkness.

She would have wanted light, you knew.

Brightness and hope.

Because life ends, she said, that's why it matters. That's why it's so precious. That's why she was no longer with you.

Because life ends. Because she'd taken her last breath in your arms. Because you couldn't make it for her.

Denouements. Conclusions. Endings.

She wanted hope, you paused her valedictorian speech. Hope and looking forward, ahead where life goes on. The play button is pressed, paused time unfolds and she's not there.

_Do I have to lose you too????_

You weren't strong enough. Powers and responsibilities were bullshit when you'd let her slip.

You wanted her to stay. Told her to, and she followed.

You told him it was between you and him (classic.) and what was implied. What was taken. What was targeted.

Was always going to be her.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for stopping by, reading, leaving kudos. You mean the world to me, dear readers <3
> 
> (Goes without saying, but Philip Philips' Gone Gone Gone is the drabble's official companion.)


End file.
